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Poetry makes nothing happen…? By Laurel Moore

Poetry makes nothing happen…?

With nothing much (1) comes quite a lot

The beginning of March (2) saw the emergence of green posters all around campus displaying the words ‘POETRY WANTED’. By May, this project has fully flourished.

The poetry in question was for an anthology connected to the natural world, with all profits donated to Greenpeace. The catalyst (3) for this project was my complete loss of hope in our fateful (4) government and how they insist on fracturing the storied earth (5). The ice they are treading on is wafer (6) thin, and we are running out of time (7). The anthology is a gesture of activism to show that people power works.

In ‘A Memory of W. B. Yeats’, W. H. Auden writes, ‘Poetry makes nothing happen’. However, the elephant (8) in the room is the rest of the line which reads ‘It survives in the valley of its making’. Auden’s analogy of the surviving poem could aptly describe each and every page in the anthology. Whilst it may not leave a mark (9) on 3.3 billion people (10), or create a ‘valley of ashes’ (11) that Wile E. Coyote would plummet down, I’d like to think that this small book will make a crater at least.

The anthology was launched on campus on the 19th of May, and the event involved readings from contributors as well as a first chance to purchase the book, creating a lot of buzz (12). In addition to poetry, photography, visual art, and prose have wormed (13) their way into the books, and rightly so.

Several people submitted contributions to the anthology, and I was thrilled to receive a poem by the renowned poet Karenjit Sandhu, who is amongst the stellar line-up for the Surrey Poetry Festival this year. I truly love both her work and ethos, so I was wholly (14) honoured by her contribution. She’ll (15) confirm my gratitude is real (16). Every contributor deserves to be typed out on my keyboard (17), but with page space here dangerously declining (18), that won’t be feasible (*weeps*) (19). So with not much room (20), I will have to settle on ‘et al’. Reading all of the contributors’ work has been edifying and provided me — and readers of the anthology — with much needed optimism. It reminds me of Emily Dickinson’s ‘“Hope” is the thing with feathers’.

The anthologies are sold at £6.50, each bound with biodegradable twine, with wrappers made from recycled paper, and the pages are FSC certified. No acacia (21) or oak (22) trees were harmed in the making of this anthology. Eighteen copies were sold at the Surrey New Writer’s Festival

There will also be another upcoming chance to buy copies at the Surrey Poetry Festival, which will be held in the SLL Common Room (61AD02) on the 10th of June (12:00-21:00). It is free to attend and open to all. You can contact Stephen Mooney (s.mooney@surrey.ac.uk) or Ian Heames (i.heames@surrey.ac.uk) for more information.

I have plenty of poetry projects on the burned horizon (23). So if you’re a poet and you have work that you would like to see printed in a book, or if you’d like to buy a copy of the anthology, drop me an email (lm01690@surrey.ac.uk).

That's all folks. (24)

  1. Burgeoning small press that presents the anthology
  2. A link to the anthology’s title Now is the Time for Marching, albeit a tenuous one
  3. See final line of ‘Extruded’ (Grant, p. 31) and line 6 of ‘Kindling’ (Gallant, p. 33)
  4. A reference to ‘This Fatefully Predetermined Choice’ (Doss, p. 42-43)
  5. See line 5 or 15 of ‘Fenrir’ (Rose, p. 48)
  6. See illustration on the final page
  7. See line 9 of ‘Weeping Willow’ (Crush, p. 47)
  8. A reference to ‘Elephant knees’ (Doss, p. 41) and line 10 of ‘Craggysphere’ (Sandhu, p. 57)
  9. See line 34 of ‘Mother’s Day 2050’ (Korabandi, p.53)
  10. See line 1 of ‘A chilling encounter’ (Gilson, p. 36)
  11. See final line of ‘Kindling’ (Gallant, p. 33)
  12. A reference to ‘Wasp: H-ate it!’ (Bonneau, p. 44)
  13. A reference to earthworm person (Steer, p. 2)
  14. See photography of holly (McKenna, p. 19)
  15. See Banner poems for justice series (Papachristodolou, p. 29)
  16. A reference to ‘Unicorn is Real’ (Mooney, p. 29)
  17. See lines 4 and 23 of untitled poem (Michealidou, p. 40)
  18. See line 18 of ‘Wasp: H-ate it!’ (Bonneau, p. 44)
  19. A reference to ‘Weeping Willow’ (Crush, p. 47)
  20. See photography of mushrooms (Gray, p. 20 and p. 22)
  21. A reference to ‘Acacia Trees’ (Han, p. 9)
  22. A reference ‘The Grove of Oaks’ (Lawton, p. 13)
  23. See line 1 of ‘Desertification’ (Camilleri, p. 1)
  24. A reference to ‘That’s all folks’ (Moore, p. 56)

Notes <https://www.poetryfoundation.org/harriet-books/2009/11/poetry-makes-nothing-happen-or-does-it>